This webpage is a copy of an original pdf document that you can get upon request by emailing academic@tcnj.edu.
Table of Contents
- Alignment with Key Institutional Documents and Values
- Categories of Accepted Scholarly/Professional/Creative Work
- Criteria to Evaluate Different Types of Scholarly/Creative/Professional Work
- Scope, Quality, Importance and Coherence of Scholarly/Professional/Creative Program
- Authorship
The attached disciplinary standards have been reviewed and approved by the Committee on Faculty Affairs, the Council of Deans, and the Provost.
To avoid creating a moving target for candidates for reappointment, the disciplinary standards in effect during a faculty member’s first year of employment will be used for reappointment and tenure applications. Candidates for promotion will use the disciplinary standards in effect in the year in which they apply for promotion.
The Art and Art History Department will next review its disciplinary standards in Academic Year 2018.
1. Alignment with Key Institutional Documents and Values
In outlining our disciplinary standards for scholarship with regard to tenure and promotion, we note the following:
The Visual Arts Disciplinary Standards are consistent with the Mission of the College, the School of Arts and Communication, and the Department of Art and Art History. We recognize that the College is a primarily undergraduate institution with no targeted masters programs in Visual Arts. We expect that our faculty members are accomplished and engaged teacher-scholars and that our students are accomplished and engaged learners. The program’s Disciplinary Standards are consistent with the criteria set forth in the Promotion and Reappointment Document dated November 2014.
The faculty of the Department of Art and Art History embrace the model of a teacherscholar who is an artist or designer engaged in defining new directions for critical inquiry, shaping the arts and culture in the contemporary world, and communicating their importance to the broader community. Therefore, TCNJ artists and designers write grant proposals, create works of art that cross mediums, and exhibit works in venues of various types. They engage in creative activity while also meeting the mission of the college to serve as mentors to students as they become apprentices and young practitioners. This latter role, by definition, engages the faculty member as a _teacher who also guides the creative efforts of students in the studio and the field.
2. Categories of Accepted Scholarly/Professional/Creative Work
The Visual Arts program recognizes a range of modes of Creative Work and Creative Research. Faculty creative activity informs instruction and service, contributes to professional development, and advances knowledge and creative expression. It includes professional activities leading to exhibitions/competitions, creative and/or scholarly publications (production, expression, research, etc.) formal presentations (panels, juries, lectures, invitations) as well as professional testimony and residencies/grants/sponsored projects.
The Visual Arts programs encourage and promote interdisciplinary work and recognize that there are diverse paths to successful outcomes in a professor’s scholarship/professional/creative work. It is understood within the fields of Visual Arts that creative work and professional research often is the result of a combination of both research/development and outcomes in the form of exhibitions, competitions, and publications. The achievements of each candidate should connect with the medium in which the faculty member is teaching, but consideration should always be given for new endeavors, connections between disciplines, or areas of research that support the mission of the College as a whole. A period of research to develop new ideas is understood to be necessary in creating new work. Outcomes may be different for each discipline or subdiscipline since each has its own respective cultural values and opportunities. Faculty members should indicate how creative/research achievements connect with the context of the specific field and include information on the factors that determine the significance of the activities.
When discussing both creative development and research outcomes, each candidate should make efforts to indicate this context through as much specificity as possible. These descriptions should appear in the PRC Narrative as well as the Standardized CV for reviewers.
It is important that the following qualifications be defined and evaluated in a manner that all faculty members observe as fair and reasonable. We note that the range of scholarly outcomes recognized as significant creative visual research in the disciplines of Fine Arts, Digital Arts and Graphic Design include but are not limited to the following 8 categories:
Acceptable Categories of Creative Work
- Professional exhibitions/competitions including web-based, networked,
curatorial projects, refereed publications, web projects, consultancies,
collaborative projects with other artists and distributed forms - Reproduction of work in publications and online
- Publication of writing on art, design, or both
- Lectures/invitations to present work
- Panels/juries/curatorial
- Residencies, grants and other sponsored projects
- Professional testimony (i.e. reviews, interviews)
- Design projects that contribute new knowledge to design and related fields
3. Criteria to Evaluate Different Types of Scholarly/Creative/Professional Work
For both tenure and promotion (at all levels) The Visual Arts program expects that a candidate exhibit excellence in producing a sustained and respectable body of creative research. At the same time, in evaluating the strength of a candidate’s body of creative research and production, we heed the following considerations outlined in the College Art Association Standards for Retention and Tenure of Visual-Arts Faculty.
-
- Exhibition of creative work is to be regarded as analogous to publication in other fields (from College Art Association).
- For artists using new technologies, artistic production in the area of technology-based media encompasses many formats. Contributions to theory should be seen as having equal significance as aesthetic production. As the field evolves, technology-based faculty in the Arts should be free to pursue whatever new forms are most appropriate for personal artistic and 2 technological growth, both for themselves and for their students (from College Art Association).
- Freedom of expression and inquiry must be supported and protected (from College Art Association).
As candidates increase in seniority, we expect that their work will secure them professional recognition, which could be expressed in a variety of ways. For example, a candidate’s work might be commissioned, selected for an artist-fellowship or artist-inresidence, addressed or cited in scholarly articles, be the subject of a professional symposium or a session at a national conference, be invited to exhibit, juror, lecture or consult, and other ways recognized by the Visual Arts. We encourage faculty members to present their scholarship to students and engage students in the production and dissemination of that scholarship as appropriate in the context of the College’s value of teaching. Similarly, we encourage faculty members to apply their research expertise in appropriate service venues either on campus, in their local communities, or in the society at large.
Candidates for tenure and promotion may demonstrate scholarly excellence in a number of different ways. We illustrate this below by means of scenarios using the 8 categories listed in section B of this document. The aim of these scenarios is to indicate the ways in which a candidate can satisfy minimum scholarship expectations. The specific numbers of exhibitions, competitions, etc. in these scenarios will vary depending on the scope and venue, with fewer requirements if works are presented nationally and internationally.
Candidates will meet annually with the Art and Art History Personnel Committee for progress reviews prior to the tenure decision. The standards are to be interpreted as normally applying from date of initial appointment at TCNJ, but may include work completed elsewhere during the years granted towards promotion at the initial hire. Ordinarily, this is instructional experience at an accredited institution of higher education. Whether such experience will be included, and to what extent must be negotiated at the time of initial appointment in a mutually acceptable agreement in writing between the faculty member and The College of New Jersey. Successful completion of additional work beyond tenure leading to promotion to Associate Professor, and beyond Associate Professor leading to promotion to Professor are included in the increasing expectations in number and quality listed in the scenarios presented below.
Pre-Tenure Reappointment Guidelines (unless different agreement made at time of appointment):
1st year: Actively engaged in creative work that will lead to successful completion of some items in categories #1-8, indicating a potential for professional research direction
2nd year: Show clear research direction leading toward successful completion of some items in categories #1-8; regional honors or recognition
3rd year: Continued successful completion of some items in categories #1-8; regional or national honors or recognition
4th year: Continued successful completion of more items in categories #1-8; regional, national, or international honors or recognition
Scenarios for Tenure:
Scenario A: Two items from category #1 and at least one other item from the creative professional activities listed in categories #2-8
Scenario B: Three items from the scholarly activities listed in categories #1-4 and at least one other item from the activities listed in categories #1-8
Scenario C: Three items from the scholarly activities listed in categories #8 (The exact number may vary due to the size, and complexity of the projects) and at least one other item from the activities listed in categories #1-7
Scenarios for Promotion to Associate Professor:
Scenario A: Two items from category #1 and at least two other items from the scholarly activities listed in categories #2-8
Scenario B: Three items from the activities listed in categories #1-6 and at least two other items from the creative professional activities listed in categories #1-8
Scenario C: Three items from the scholarly activities listed in categories #8 (The exact number may vary due to the size, and complexity of the projects) and at least two other items from the activities listed in categories #2-7
Recognition received for works completed within the previous 3 years may be considered but the primary focus must be the production of work after joining The College of New Jersey, or as a significant continuation of a previous project. Whether previous projects can be included and to what extent must be agreed upon at the time of initial appointment in an arrangement between the faculty member and The College of New Jersey.
Scenarios for Promotion to Full Professor:
Scenario A: Two items from category #1, two items from the activities listed in categories #2-5, and at least four other items from the activities listed in categories #2-8
Scenario B: Seven items from amongst the activities listed in categories #1-5 and at least four other items from the scholarly activities listed in categories #1-8
Scenario C: Seven items from amongst the activities listed in categories #8 (The exact number may vary due to the size, and complexity of the projects.) and at least four other items from the scholarly activities listed in categories #1-7
The Promotion document states that “Promotion to Professor requires a sustained pattern of scholarly activity attaining the rank of Associate Professor, with evidence indicating the maturation of the scholarly/creative/professional record.” For the Department of Art and Art History we require consistent production of new work that fulfills the scenario requirements above with the primary focus being work finalized since promotion to associate professor.
4. Scope, Quality, Importance and Coherence of Scholarly/Professional/Creative Program
Exhibiting, lecturing, presenting and distributing visual research that is international in its scope is regarded as highly successful, with the venue also taken into consideration. National and regional exhibitions are considered very valuable programs, with the venue also taken into consideration. The expected productivity articulated in these scenarios is intended to provide guidelines, not hard and fast numbers, and reflect how we expect the quality and coherence of a candidate’s creative oeuvre to mature over time. The Visual Arts value and looks favorably on student engagement in a candidate’s scholarly work (e.g., in the publication of articles, in conference presentations), but does not regard it as a sine qua non for tenure or promotion. Since we are a small program and teach undergraduates only, candidates for tenure and promotion should demonstrate a breadth of scholarly interests commensurate with the needs of the program and compatible with the contributions that the program makes to liberal learning. At the same time, candidates should demonstrate that they are engaged in coherent programs of scholarship. The production of creative work and other activities related to creative work, including points 1-8, constitute scholarship and should relate to the primary discipline in which they teach.
5. Authorship
The Visual Arts recognize different kinds of authorship patterns ( e.g., individual or collaborative practitioner) in visual arts research projects, and that collaborative efforts may sometimes require as much or more effort as single authored projects. Candidates who wish to count collaborative works toward tenure or promotion should clearly articulate, however, the proportion of the work and/or sections of the work (in those cases when a faculty member created a particular component of the project) for which they are responsible. As also indicated above, the Visual Arts value and looks favorably on student engagement in a candidate’s work, but does not regard it as a sine qua non for tenure.